The Peace of No Contact

Since I severed ties from the ENTIRE family, some months ago I have felt a lot better.

There's a few I'm ghosting on Facebook but I don't plan to talk to them again. The main no contact was three years ago but this was a step I had to make. I have felt more calm and with more peace.  I went through some hell the last few years, I felt like the grief was going to rip me to shreds inside. Facing what life had become, realizing that all the relationships were nonexistent or irrevocably broken, it was not easy. In many ways I held on dreaming of relationships that should have been but really did not exist. I pictured myself going out to eat or shopping with my nieces, or having talks with my nephews. None of this ever happened EVER. I just lived too far away, and I know now I was kept away purposefully. Why did I cling on so long to people who did not want me? They did me no favors, keeping the lowest level of contact they could must with me just to keep track of me, and that's all it was. There was no love or relationship in it. There was a lot of years of wasted energy.

Many online ACONs helped me and kept me going telling me, it would get easier, the harsh emotions would FINALLY ebb away. I am finally entering a period now where there is peace. Whatever sacrifices I made being able to wake up and not have to worry about being "enough" for these people, is worth it. I almost want to tell people the first few years will be the hardest, but to WAIT. Don't give in and crawl back to your abusers. Emotions will tell you to do it. The early guilt, the shaming and derision of flying monkeys and enablers, there is a lot of pressure put upon an ACON going no contact. You must make the intellectual choice to hang on to it, no matter what.

One thing that happened for me via no contact, is I ended YEARS of severe anxiety and panic attacks. My disability is based on my physical problems but my anxiety was disabling in itself. If I can't breathe well, I still can get natural anxiety but I no longer have panic attacks like I had for DECADES. This was a serious problem for me, it helped to destroy my health. Multiple therapists diagnosed me with PTSD, and at least one with generalized anxiety disorder. Doing the final severing of narc enablers actually lowered the anxiety levels even more.

 I remember even as an adult in my 30s driving up the drive-way, feeling the wave of inside terror and fear and grinding my teeth to put myself in "grey rock" mode. Sometimes on ACON message boards, I warn against low contact and grey-rocking for years. It can hurt you. it did me.

 My vulnerability and pain in the last few years actually did destroy some friendships, but most of those were better let go of. People who go on the attack while you are hurting, you are better off being without. Cutting off your entire family can be a litmus test for who really loves you and well those who don't. Facing the facts one never had a family can be the same as someone who has a loving family go down in a jetliner.

 A lot of hurt and pain was still coming in via her flying monkeys and family of enablers.  Every time I talked even to one of the cousins or others, a new scab was being ripped open.  In my case, I had to face the serious facts, that there was no one left uncontrolled or monitored or manipulated by my mother. I was in some denial about this but had to face facts. Just the most minute contact with even an extended cousin left me in tears. They lovingly spoke of my mother and other abusers who had no respect for me. They never answered questions. In some ways Aunt Scapegoat's death while I mourned her deeply, it freed me. It gave me the impetus to know the whole system was sick, and to sever my final ties. It allowed me to give up persuing people who cared nothing about me. It allowed me to climb up out of the pit of trying to one day "have a family" or finally "be accepted or loved".

 I saw through how they treated her even in death, with no respect, and disdain. When I watched all that the worse sides of human nature were made known to me in this sick world where status is everything, and those who have it taken away are crushed under the boot heels of the "first" in line.

 I knew that could not be me. People who treat you like nothing and make you feel like nothing need cut out of your life.  This is why I did not send flowers or go to her funeral. My honor for her memory is walking, and thinking of what could of been. Maybe wherever she is at now, she knows the truth and understands what was done. Having that relationship destroyed and many others, was too much. I thought back to who she was and who I was. I wish I had done more for her. I wish I had gotten free sooner able to send a life line in to yank her out but she made her choices on her end too.

The family will be breaking apart after my departure. Being in contact with some of these extended people before I left, I could tell the division of the family was growing greater and greater. They were having less to do with one another. They still had their "reunions" and family "gatherings" but they were less frequent. On the day of Aunt Scapegoat's funeral, the family showed up, spent the hour or what not and then went their separate ways even after drives of hundreds of miles.  I would decide to go NC with the entire family within that week. My brother has nothing to do with my sister and my sister never takes notes of his children or her nephews. The existence of a "family" at this point in the game is a mere mirage. 

Well I no longer was interested in pretending. Going to family gatherings which were about as fun and personal as my job interviews of 25 years ago, was a waste of time. Narcissists create distance, and if everyone lives 100 miles or more for each other for decades, it amounts to people simply not knowing each other. Too many don't talk about anything real out of fear of rocking the boat. One thing I noted among the enablers was the severe fear. Even in private communications they felt unable to answer direct questions.

I have relief and far more peace, no longer doing the scared enabler dance with them.

 I still remember that letter I wrote to the family in 2012, where I wrote "This family needs more open communication not less!" when my mother sent her strange email out of topics that were allowed in her house. So as I lit my matches and burned the decaying, aging and rotting bridge of "family" behind me, I am pretty sure it will fall apart of its own accord. Maybe one young member will be like me one day, breaking away from the herd.

One day I was talking to my husband. We were worried about some bill, and I found myself chirping into the bathroom and I said, "Whatever happens now, I don't have to worry about it anymore, I have no one to look at me and jeer!". And then it struck me. My life was my own. No more worrying about the judge and jury staring down with their hateful narc eyes. No more flying monkeys collecting dirt on me, or making me feel bad. I said to my husband, "Whatever happens, happens now, I am free of them! It doesn't matter anymore in that, it's only for us to worry about!". 

I do feel more peace now. It did bring back some returned memories, I may write on them later but for today I'm letting it rest. It told me my decision was the best one. It is changing who I am as a person and how I relate to others. I am feeling the load of fear I have carried on my back for decades ebbing away.  There is more peace now. It took me some serious time and there will probably be other hurdles to cross, but dealing with 40 decades worth of abusers is not an easy task. I have become a more calm person which is something new for me.

A Feeling of Relief over the Scorched Earth

Ever since I went NC from the entire family this week and unfriended the last of them on Facebook, I have had a feeling of major relief. This has surprised me to the degree it has been.

It is like I threw off a two-ton weight off my back. I realized even trying to deal with the ones I thought were "nicer" was just re-opening wounds over and over and giving the main narcs an ability to abuse me by proxy. I realized this over the last year especially. Their calls, emails and even rare messages on Facebook bothered me.

I don't have to try anymore or bang my head against the wall.

I don't have to worry about sending cards out anymore that are just ignored.

I don't have to worry about phone calls.

I don't have to feel guilt over not having money or health to visit people who never come my direction.

I don't have to cry over not being visited or loved or accepted or seen.

I don't have to worry about proving myself anymore to people who never would accept me.

I don't have to worry about sticking to a false fantasy of a family that was never there for me.

My modus operanti now is to remove all narcs from my life. If people don't like me or put me down or I feel I have to "prove" myself to them, I am done.  I am applying this to daily life. Achievement queens and put-downers, I am done with. No more being the scapegoat, or ignored or devalued in any group.

I just want to live in peace. I have had more peace being NC, but now the peace will be more complete.

The Grief

I was warned by good friends, that once I was into No Contact long enough that some emotions would be rising up especially once I got to the one year marker and beyond. ACON blogs attest to the feelings of anger and grief that rise up as the scapegoat especially disengages themselves and processes what they went through.

Healing rests in truth-telling, making space for good and positive people and letting go of a family that only has hurt you over and over again. I do see the light at the end of the tunnel of all this.

 The other day I told my husband, one thing I say to myself, is, "I can be happy in my own simple life". I have depended on the love of God, my husband and friends to make it through. One thing I am doing lately is seeking happy days, where I focus on fun activities like watching a loved show with a friend or my hobbies, and these are the things I am adding to my sum of my days and focusing on.

The grief I know is real, and many of us have faced it.  Sometimes it can feel like when you go no contact, that your entire family went down in a jumbo jet and you got the phone call yesterday but then we have to be honest with ourselves and realize the actual relationships we had with these people were not at all what we wanted them to be or imagined them to be.

Freedom From The Narc Family Cult: How No Contact is Changing Me For the Better

Run little girl Run! {ok this being the Victorian era people didn't smile

for photos so hopefully her Mom was a nice one and not a narcissist}

I'll be no contact outside of sending my no contact letter for exactly one year on June 28th, 2014.
I can't believe I've made it this long. By the way, even after the two line brush off, my NM tried to call me on the last holiday--Easter. I wasn't home thankfully.

For me leaving the family "cult", all narcissist families operate like cults in a certain way in that certain beliefs and rules are insisted upon, has led to me challenging long held beliefs and how I see the world. This has included redefining myself and also redefining my view of the world. This has led to changes in my life.

NO MORE "SUPERIORS VS. INFERIORS" or AKA SCAPEGOATS vs. "Winners"

Some  people are irritated with me by the Tiffany Sedaris article, but even if she was full blown bipolar or other theories I've seen forwarded, don't you see why I saw some things in common? My family aren't millionaires, but upper middle class, I saw the scoffing, the raised eye-brows, from the narcissists, what some liberals call "micro-aggressions" on disgusted faces. So few understand what it is, to be the scapegoat, the one who "didn't make it" in a family where achievement and appearances counts for everything and the pain that this can cause a person. Some may think I am making too many inferences, but to be frank, I read his essay and wrote my view of what it had to say. Nothing more, nothing less. If only Tiffany had been able to be free of these messages. I know they are false messages that have led me almost to the pit of despair. This is why God's Word especially regarding the truth about the poor and how children of God matter beyond material success were like a life-line thrown out to a drowning woman.

Everyone interprets things via their own life experiences. For me, her story is a greater story, in that in too many families now there is little care and comfort for those who may struggle from challenges. Family break-up isn't just coming from divorce or long distance moves but also from changed and colder hearts towards people in general. My mother used to write on a social website, "how proud" she was of one relative and another relative, constantly. I translate these messages as ---We are proud you reflected well on us.---- You know that sort of thing.

                                           [picture source]
                                       
Ever sit at a high school awards ceremony where they crowned the best and the brightest plastic silver painted crowns for the beauty queens and felt that creeping feeling that your looks, athletic ability and 3.5 gpa or even 2.0 one didn't cut the muster and like less of a person? What is sad is the competing never seems to end. Why do we have to prove ourselves so much? Why can't we just be? How many great individuals are being lost in the morass? Status is so much in American society.

Now imagine your family being run like a high school awards ceremony and beauty contest. The narcs paying homage to the beautiful, thin, and successful. I saw an aunt crack up from not achieving what the family thought was worthy. For years I heard how she was a loser and deserved her poverty. I know the same things have been said about me.  Life together competing instead of working together as a team or sharing any true fellowship.

This is one web I am untangling now in my mind and walking away from.. Some aspects of society back up everything they said and did to me. That is the worse thing. Religious faith, gives me honor as a child of God, but how many hits are millions taking to their souls, for being told it's not about who you are but what you achieve and that if you don't win a crown or make enough money that you are a nobody.

 So this is one belief, the "cult" taught me being ground into the dust under my foot. Here I am claiming dignity in myself as a person and realizing I am not worse, or inferior. I am laying claim to who I am.  This is definitely one burden that if I succeed in throwing it over the side of the boat, I will be a far happier person in the long run. Compassion and love will grow in a the crucible of being away from this narcissist training.

                                                         [picture source]
                                                     
NO MORE FEAR

For years I lived in fear of that woman, lesser so with her Mini-me.  Every time, we would drive up her long black drive-way up to her house, a feeling of nausea would come over me. One was on edge, as if they were walking at 2 am, in the worse neighborhood they could find in a huge city.  I was afraid. Very afraid. I prayed to get through the day.

 ACONs know the dark fear, they instilled in us so directly. As a child, one look, one sharp word, you were scurrying to please the narcissist to avert the punishment or back stabbing that you knew would be inevitable. Even today I know my fear was almost irrational. When I was young, I towered over her and outweighed her.  Keep in mind I am woman who has directly worked with gang-bangers and teen murderers and rapists. I'm not a shrinking violet, but that woman always has scared the crap out of me in the depths of my being. Sometimes I think my upbringing instilled an outer toughness, so the juvenile home and residential counseling place for sociopathic and/or violent girls, thought well that one will survive here, lets hire her even though she is fat with an odd body shape!

But for all that at least surface toughness, inside my body was roiling.  I was afraid of her. I used to ask myself, "What is wrong with you?". She never touched me as an adult. As I got more ill, I realized severe illnesses could be triggered around my mother, where my asthma would become out of control, where the day I had a visit was always the same day giant kidney painful stones came to visit. They came at other times but were guaranteed on those days.  Leg infections would be triggered within minutes in their company. My immune system seemed to collapse whenever I was in the same room with my mother.

Benadryl and copious amounts of a IBS drug used for what it was prescribed for which gave me a slight buzz would be my "helpers" during my visits. My last visit in 2013 at her house, I started projectile vomiting, and actually barfed into a bag in the car to get the hell away. Not wanting to to end up in a hospital 75 miles away from home, I puked continously as my husband drove, while he asked me if he could take me to the ER instead. Head shaking saying "No, No, No", I just wanted to get home to wait out that would be kidney stone passing.  We had the rule that if I got acutely ill, we were to immediately leave. Asthma, too much swelling, breathing troubles, barfing, meant an immediate exit. This was no mother that was going to pet me on the head, or bring me chicken soup or even give me a place to lie down during extended visits. The expectation for someone like myself who sleeps in a hospital bed at night and has needed at home-nursing care several times, is that I always was to go her way. Today I know that was insane in itself.

 Mine is so good at creating fear in others. It still boggles my mind. I'm the only one in the entire extended family who has ever stood up against her on anything. The rest don't even have normal human disagreements or arguments with her and that's a red flag. One strange thing I have noticed for years is how many would tell me behind the scenes how they agreed with me, that something with her [and my sister] was very wrong and that she was not like other people and she was cold and cruel to me. Some even whispered how she had done them wrong or frightened them.  Despite these backdoor conversations, no one ever challenged her, or disagreed with her, EVER, well except for me! The only exception to this was my brother a few times did stand up for me as she insulted my weight with me not present.

 But even as this crushing fear affected me so much of my life as I still worry about our finances, or experiencing worse poverty when I sat back and thought about things, I thought "What can be done to me anymore?". As long as the system has not crashed, America helps out the disabled and gives you housing. I have friends and a church now. Oddly I have smiled multiple times to myself over the last year thinking, "they aren't there to put me down anymore".

No more do I have to sit in a room, a tight smile on my face, waiting to be told that I am inferior or that my life doesn't matter or watch a nasty woman sneer at me. They aren't there to tell me I am wrong or to devalue me. Their opinion no longer matters. I can face whatever life will bring but be free of their cruelties and that inside fear, that used to tighten my stomach.

For years I had anxiety disorders, some are medically related--if you have breathing problems or sugar crashes, you will feel anxiety, but I have regular anxiety too. These often can be co-morbs that go with Aspergers too. My panic attacks and feeling of inside fear, dropped by at least 50% since I got away from the narcissists. My inside fear started going away. One recent therapist told me, I appeared far more confident.

So my fear dropped. And today, I stay away from people who make me afraid.

                                          [picture source]
                                         
DEVELOPING BOUNDARIES AND SELF CARE

Malignant narcs and sociopaths train scapegoats like a puppy getting their newspaper, hey when we are children we do not know any better. We are trained to be subservient to their needs while neglecting our own. The needs of a scapegoat mean nothing to narcs. One negative attribute of this that can be lifelong for ACONs is they do not learn how to take care of themselves. I also have had to fill in multiple gaps on adult living skills, some of which have been worked on as late as this year, when I had occupational therapy.

I was severely medically neglected when I was young. This ranged from neglect of my serious signs of autism as a youngster--not walking until I was nearly 2 years old, stimming, etc to the ignoring of several of my medical issues.  I had serious signs of PCOS while very young by the age of 12/13, where my neck turned so brown my mother would yell at me. A then 100lb weight gain which took me from near normal to midsized, within a period of one year was ignored. Lipedema was coming to join the party along with everything else.

 My asthma was neglected for quite some time and diagnosed on the day, I was 18 and had a university health center at my disposal. Before then when I could not breathe, my parents would just yell at me, "You can't cope". Luckily I just wheezed and coughed and coughed and didn't get to the turning blue point at that time in life.

When I became a adult I did not know how to care for myself. Today in my 40s, I have more ability to care for myself and have learned how in a better fashion. Being around people where I can express needs and put up healthy boundaries, has been a joy. I also realized as I got older and was around NICE people, that life spent among positive, nice, kind people who make allowances for other human beings and treated them with compassion is a far happier life. Even years ago I made changes this way, but these were continued. Leaving toxic relationships left more space for good ones. It also allowed me to learn to form better boundaries.

 It is okay to ask for help, to rest and to seek happiness. It is good to seek positive self-care and take care of one's self. I know as I went no contact, I was able to deal with my health problems in a more positive fashion where my self-care and self-love grew. There was forgiveness for myself in getting sick in the first place.

 This erased some shame and blame that I had carried for far too long. Facing down the great lie, that I was a failure in getting sick, and that everything was my fault, was extraordinarily freeing. This was yet another lie of the Narcs, I was able to confront and set myself free from.

                                          [picture source]

IMPROVED RELATIONSHIPS

There are only a few relatives left in my life, but relationships free of back door back-stabbing sessions by narcissists and triangulation, IMPROVE. With a few people I care about and love, I reached back out and the ones willing to know me outside of the picture presented by the narcissists, I saw definite improvements with. With all parties I have opened up and told them things, they simply did not know. Not being too naive, I have even warned that the narcissists may try and get in between us and said, "Do not believe anything they may say about me." Here getting to know people and having them know me outside of the narcissist control has been a joy.

In my journal, I drew a cartoon of myself breaking the chains...and that is exactly what it was. 

When Scapegoats are Ostracized By an Entire Family

[cite for all pictures-This Charming Charlie]

At every job I used to have pre-disability life, I always managed to find one friend or ally usually in the mix if I was there long enough and it wasn't a temp job. Every organization, club or church I have been a part of, I usually ended up with a couple of friends. And in my case, I don't just have pals though everyone has those but real friends I can talk about anything with.  Sure I'm shy to a few people but my social fortunes were far poorer among those I was related to.

Today I am asking how did I not end up with so few allies in my entire family? Inside there is a painful part, that says, "your whole family hated you and had little to do with you as possible, what's wrong with you?"

From the start, I was treated like an outsider. This was the scapegoating process in the narcissistic world. Sometimes it can be painful to hear people talk about their cousins, aunts, uncles, children, step-children, grand-nieces, and grandparents. I am now without one relative in my life. I never really had no family when it got right down to it.

My mother controls so many of them. Since I went no contact, not one has to tried and contact me except via her direction. No one wrote an email [they have it] and no one tried to write me via a social website.  Only two contacted me via her direction on the exact same day and wrote the words she wanted them to write. It was easy to tell.  Dry one-liners which in my sister's case screamed, "Mom told me to send this!" No whiff of any apologies or concern or anything else. No unscripted messages. It was kind of like dying ahead of time, and you walk into your own funeral or memorial service, and realizing not one relative has shown up. A big part of my going NC, was realizing impeding illness and possible shortage of time here on earth wasn't changing anything. Years ago I made too many excuses for relatives not showing up in hospitals when I was so sick except for my husband. 

Not one of the 16-23 people I walked away from, even though they know I have serious life threatening health conditions asked, "Are you all right?". I have gotten far more care from churches and organizations and clubs I have been a part of then my own supposed "family".

 Yes, they should be ashamed of themselves.  I spent too many years like Charlie here, until I found love via my husband and friends:

How does one function when their own family hated and rejected them? The worse thing my mother ever did to me  was taking other people away from me and destroying my relationships with them because they cared most about keeping her pleased and fearing her.  This happened via the result of smear campaigns, and forcing me into a role, I later rejected. My mother bonds with people by putting others down, and a smear campaign is when things are distorted and manipulated to get people to think badly of you.  The below experience as described by another ACON in her rejecting family,  got extreme for me by the way. Everything was about pleasing the queen while I was chopped liver,  some of the relatives would ask me questions like "Do you think your mother likes me"?

"I, for example, had an “over-active imagination” and while the phrase “drama queen” had yet to be invented, that was the gist of how NM painted me to the family. In a situation in which numerous motives might be at work, NM always selected the worst possible one for me, regardless of what was truly going on in my mind. Over a period of years a picture of me was formed in the minds of family members who rarely saw me and when they did, the reality of me was overshadowed by the picture in their minds.

 When NMs do this, it sets the stage for later predations. If everybody “knows” how bad you are, they have no empathy for you even though you are a small child. They feel bad for your poor mother and admire her courage and bravery in continuing to deal with you and even love you despite your awfulness. Cousins ignore, disdain and/or bully you. It becomes a habit to hate you, a habit to blame you, a habit that becomes entrenched and unquestioned after so many years, and it spreads from one family member to the next like a disease." [link]

 This sums things up. Everything revolved around her. Nothing she said about me was questioned. For me the bad way the family looked at me spread like a disease too. Some relatives would change on a dime once she had a visit with them or saw them more. There was one point I even said to  my siblings, "Can we Have our OWN relationships"? By the way this is not unknown in the narcissistic world, it is known that narcissistic mothers via triangulation and manipulative ways destroy relationships, especially between the chosen scapegoat and others. I think this happened in the extreme with me and it cost me the entire family.

When one thinks about mankind, I wonder if this is the microcosm of toxic families that shows the macrocosm of why in the world, so many sociopathic dictators rule who seek to destroy those who are good, or creative or have another voice or who stand for truth. In other words why do folks like Stalin and Hitler rule the roost, and get others do their evil bidding? If anything in this fallen world, the more evil a leader, the more control they seem to gain. This was true of my mother. Her power was complete.

 I don't know everything my mother told my other relatives about me, but whatever it was it was bad. One thing I did notice was the constant invalidation, that no matter what I did or said, it did not matter. Even if one family member agreed with me or backed me up even for the slightest second and that was rare, she seemed to always make sure that this would end no matter how petty of a matter it was. Any rebellion was quashed and any alliance with me, was to be thwarted.  I have heard her tell people directly, I was not important, and not worth the bother. Imagine people listening to this for years and years?

Before I went NC, I caught some of this stuff in action, she told my brother not to visit me last fall because it would be "too much trouble". I had not seen that brother in 4-5 years. He went to go visit her and followed her directions.  She told a cousin, I was silly and stupid to stand up for my personal beliefs, this was the family gathering where she actually emailed everyone a list of topics no one was allowed to discuss and he went along with her even though at first he had agreed with me. That was yet another betrayal. She has the money, presents and fancy dinners to give them, I do not.

One part of my going NC, was realizing I did not want to be the forever scapegoat, the person that mattered not, where my forever role among these people seemed to be "fat, poor, loser" and nothing else. By the way, they know about the endocrine disorders and the mild Aspergers, it made not one whit of difference. There was no give or take on the health problems and how I was finding travel far more difficult. I haven't even seen friends in my old town 150 miles away due to the limitations of funds and health now to make the trip. Sitting in a car with severe lymphedema is a different matter then the average person. Many were just flat out mean, including one uncle who on a social website, who would insult the poor knowing of my economic struggles.

It was sad to see the growing subservience over the years among the clan. If the Queen didn't like you, then others realized this, and to stay in her good graces they would avoid you, and at least not want to become close to you. This basically sums up, why I ended up where I did. She totally ruled the roost. One way she totally ruled, is she always came first when it came to visits or anything else. The light was shined on her, while I stood to the side in darkness.

Until I found ACON boards and read how this happens with these severe personality disorders, the malignant narcissists have the extreme talent to isolate the scapegoats,  for years I questioned how did this happen? I blamed myself for far too long. At least now I know.

It's scary how I tried so hard over so many years to work on relationships that were a dead end. Trying to write letters to this one aunt, only to be ignored. Sending one aunt a painting I did, and a box of  gifts only to have her throw it into the bottom of the closet and have it get water damaged. By the way she was the scapegoat of the last generation, and I will write about her soon too. She was no ally, she allowed herself to be crushed into nothing by these people and served as a warning.

Trying to call another who never called back. Inviting cousins and others to visit only to be ignored. Visiting people out of state even during years I was at extremely high weights and had breathing issues, timing those visits for non- housebound times, swelling up in the car for hundreds of miles {I was limited to trips that took one day to get there and back with some hours to visit} and never having anyone return the favor. No one calling, the immediate members of the family calling at the level of the bare minimum, the not being invited to weddings, and parties and other family events, or being set up not to show up with others like my sister refusing to share their plans, it all added up. I tried too hard too long. I got the feeling over the years, that duty and appearances were the only things keeping the head matriarch even bothering with me.

What is weird is how much I tried to approach them and tried to take an interest in them as people while they took none in me. I told them, I felt bad about how I lacked the money and finances to visit as much as I wanted--I did push myself body and otherwise to visit as much as I could. Part of this was even informing them, that I haven't even seen one of my favorite places on earth my old small town, in more then two years. I would invite them to visit, and I live in a place that is popular, with plenty to do.  For years when I lived in my remote rural town, I thought that was why no one visited, but really it was more, because when I moved to where I live now, I moved smack dab in the middle of my mother and sister who live 300-400 miles apart and off the highway they use, and that changed NOTHING as they visited each other for years and weeks at a time. My mother would drive thousands of miles to go out of state, hundreds to go visit others. She never misses a family event and is there for everyone to see which limited my role even more as a nobody within the family while she waged her smear campaigns against me. She considered me unimportant and the others at her direction jumped on the bandwagon.

I live 75 miles away and only saw her TWICE at my home in the last 6 years, once for an hour on my birthday when she happened to be on the way home from somewhere else, and for the 2 minute present drop off of last year. Yes, that told me what a low priority I had become among many other things.

The family was a clique and I was not in it. Most of them were 6 figures rich, I am not talking ordinary middle class types but ones who could afford a new car every two years, who owned second homes, who flew to China for business, who had massive weddings, that cost tens of thousands of dollars. Sadly though in my family, only what you DID matter not who you WERE, and all achievements were measured by the dollar signs, not by any other criteria. Volunteer work, community projects, artistic ventures did not count.

There is a divide now in the family between the upper middle class types and the few poor ones that remain. The upper class ones see themselves as extremely superior to the poor ones. They look down from mountain tops. The sad thing? Well most of the poor ones have accepted their place, I supposed they consider me uppity for not doing so and not worshipping them because of their greater money. If you do not become who they want and do not conform, you are called a loser and a failure. I grew up hearing very bad things said about cousins, aunts and uncles who did not acquire a certain income, "that one is a drunk, that one is lazy, that one is no good!" Ironically even some of the ones on their knees before the Queen were maligned all the time, but they never would believe that was happening when I told them!

One thing I read on many psychology websites, was that when Scapegoats "fight back" and are no longer willing receptacles of abuse, they are closed out. Around my 20s, I stood up against the overt abuse enough for this to begin happening. Imagine your mother is the leader of a clique and you're the rejected nerd girl, in the junior high school slam book. Thus was my life with my family. I wasn't getting invited to parties, talked to. None of the relatives ever shared any of their real selves with me, or got deeper then a cashier at a gas station. I hope and pray one day, I find out I am not really related to any of them but if I am, I lost the DNA Lotto on multiple levels.

Yes I had to give up and walk away. This scapegoat quit, and walked away from the doors slammed in her face and those who didn't even "see" her. I pray everyday that my nieces and nephews become different people who stand up for themselves and care about and love people the right way. I pray at least a few "rebel" against the family system and "come out of it". I am growing stronger since going NC, and realizing I am somebody to other people and to God. No more being a nobody to pedestrian people with no emotions who don't really care about anyone else but themselves.

Update: I went no contact with the entire family years ago. I included even cousins who "chose" her and were indoctrinated into her views and narrative. I realized as the years went on, I never really had a family in any way that the word is supposed to mean. All the nieces and nephews joined the family culture and became like them and never took interest. I did try to reach out to them as they became adults, but it was to no avail. I knew not having been able to establish connections when they were young though I attempted to, it was most likely a failed venture.